Who Actively Looks for Jobs Today? Answer: Almost Everyone [New Data]

The unemployment rate may be close to a 12-year high, but skilled candidates are still hard to come by. Even in this weaker economy, employers are competing to find and attract the same in-demand talent.

But how do talented people approach the job search today, and what influences their decisions to change jobs? The recruiting industry has traditionally believed that to attract skilled workers, employers must be prepared to go out and source “passive” candidates: people who are employed and not actively looking for jobs.

This distinction between active and passive candidates has informed how many companies approach their recruitment strategy, but new research reveals why very few are “passive” about their career in 2015 and why many employers agree.

The resulting report, Talent Attraction Study: What Matters to the Modern Candidate, will help talent acquisition organizations understand the vast opportunity to reach skilled candidates and the methods they can use to attract them. According to an Indeed survey conducted online by Harris Poll in April and May among over 4,000 Australian adults, 92% of those who are employed and were hired within the past year said they actively looked for a job in the six months prior to being hired for their current job.

Here are three more key findings that emerged from the study:

1. Today’s workforce actively seeks opportunity

92% of employed adults hired within the past year took an action to find a job within six months prior to being hired. Among this group, 44% visited an online job site and 38% looked at opportunities on company career sites.

2. The job search is always on

74% of adults in or looking to enter the labor force say they are actively looking or open to a new job, and 63% of these same adults look at jobs at least monthly. And according to our own worldwide analysis, 65% of employed people look at new jobs again within the first three months of starting a job.

The research also showed that those who actively look at job opportunities are more likely to be younger and more educated.

3. Candidates believe it’s important to direct their own job search

Employed candidates are more confident in the jobs they find themselves, rather than jobs presented by a recruiter. 62% of employed adults think they would be more successful in a job they found on their own versus one they got from a recruiter or company that contacted them. 69% of employed adults say they would feel more confident that a job is the right fit for them if they picked the company and applied versus if a recruiter contacted them.

Survey Methodology: This survey was conducted online within Australia from April 30–May 8, 2015, among 4,201 adults ages 18 and older, among whom were 2,615 employed or unemployed job seekers (2,349 employed adults and 266 unemployed job seekers), by Harris Poll on behalf of Indeed via its Quick Query omnibus product. Figures for age, sex, race/ethnicity, education, region and household income were weighted where necessary to bring them into line with their actual proportions in the population. Propensity score weighting was used to adjust for respondents’ propensity to be online.